Have you ever practiced a talk dozens of times, walked into the room, and felt your body just get away from you?
Your heart races. Your hands shake. There's a quiver in your voice that everyone can hear — or at least, that's what your brain tells you.
That's public speaking anxiety, and for a lot of introverted leaders it quietly decides which rooms you step into and which ones you avoid. Over time it stops being a bad moment and starts being a ceiling.
Tamara Laine spent her twenties buckling in Broadway auditions — she'd rehearse a song to perfection with a coach, then be physically unable to sing it in front of people. Years later, working as an on-air correspondent, her body finally gave out on set. She thought she was having a seizure. It was a full panic attack, live on national television.
She didn't leave the work. She went and built the tools. Today she's a startup founder who keynotes conferences, and in this conversation she walks through exactly what she does before she speaks — including the part she does in public, where nobody can tell.
In this episode you'll discover:
- Reframe the anxiety as evidence of growth — Tamara only ever felt her body react when she was reaching for something bigger, which means the flutter before a keynote or a hard meeting is information, not a verdict on whether you belong there.
- Rewrite the scenario before it plays out — she writes down the catastrophic version her brain is projecting, then rewrites it out loud as the best possible outcome, because rehearsing the disaster is what creates the disaster. Pair it with box breathing (in four, hold four, out four, hold four) and you have a portable protocol you can run in the room.
- Audit your calendar for the truth — Tamara's number one priority had zero appointments on it for a full month, and she didn't know until she looked. It's a check you can run tonight on your own last thirty days.
If public speaking anxiety has been quietly shrinking the rooms you're willing to walk into, hit play and listen now — this one hands you the toolkit.
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